Singled Out: Charles Fauna's A Total Dream

Keavin Wiggins | 05-05-2020

Charles Fauna releasing his episodic debut album "Yonder" last month and to celebrate we asked him to tell us about the track "A Total Dream". Here is the story:

A Total Dream was the very last song to be written for my debut album Yonder. It came, as many worthwhile songs frustratingly do, after the record had been finished and mixed. Yet it still demanded to be heard and so a place was saved for it. There was a manic but aggressively uplifting energy to it which I felt the record needed.

This record, Yonder, is very much a story I had planned out from the beginning. It's about human beings who are forced to leave the earth due to lack of resources in the future, and the journey of a girl as she tries to make sense of this new world and of herself. A Total Dream became her moment of true freedom. While the music is driven and positive, the lyrics are a bitter examination of her expectations and of her identity. The song's title in a way is sarcastic. "A total dream: we get along," the songs hook is a vision of utopia - a perfect world where everyone understands and loves each other that the protagonist knows does not exist. She decides it is impossible to expect everyone to come together and instead to live well for herself: embracing her personal freedom while still not being able to let go of the "dream," human connectedness, that she wishes were a reality.

Musically this song was inspired by Phoenix and LCD Soundsystem. I wanted to create a song that hardly ever changed chords but built steadily upon a foundation until it exploded. I like trying to do the most I can with as few chords as possible, letting the arrangement and production carry the weight of the song's arc.

Hearing is believing. Now that you know the story behind the song, listen and watch for yourself below and learn more about the album here